Spice grinders known to the Applicants comprise a first component that screws or snap fits onto a spice container such as a bottle. A second component fits onto the first component and is rotatable with respect to the first component. The components include teeth or serrations between which the spice is ground when the second component is rotated on the first component. With these known grinders it is not possible to see if the spice grinder has been tampered with.
To grind the peppercorns, the bottle to which the spice grinder is fitted is inverted and the parts of the grinder rotated relatively to one another. Ground pepper falls from the spice grinder. When the bottle is returned to its upright position, partially ground peppercorns, and ground pepper which has not fallen from the grinder, fall back into the bottle. Thus the bottle, after a period of use, contains peppercorns, peppercorn pieces and ground peppercorns. Hence, what is dispensed, after the bottle has been used for some time, is not freshly ground pepper but a mixture of freshly ground pepper and pepper ground at some earlier time.
The present invention seeks to provide a spice grinder which includes a means to indicate if the product has been tampered with. The invention furthermore seeks to provide a grinder in which the quantity of partially ground peppercorns and ground pepper which falls back into the bottle is minimised.